My mind has been full of ideas for the past couple of months with ideas for Christmas teacher gifts, pre-school classmate gifts, etc but the ideas never had time to materialize until the last minute (and I mean 'morning of' type of last minute). Between getting out my wall letter orders, getting presents together to ship before the Post Office becomes a nightmare, and chasing around a 3 year old… the craft ideas kept getting pushed to another day. And then another; and another. You get the idea. So my theme for the next few days is that all the projects are fast and realistic for us last minute Christmas divas. My first "last minute Christmas diva" project, Christmas Crayons from Chocolate Molds and broken crayons, is a perfect gift for your child's classmates or stocking stuffers for your children.
MATERIALS:
Crayons (great use for old, broken crayons)
Chocolate Molds
Tin cans (old soup cans, coffee cans, etc work great)
Boiling Pot
HOW-TO:
1. Remove wrappers from crayons. I used all green shades in one batch, then all pink/red shades in the next, and all the blue shades in the last batch
2. Using the double broiler method, melt crayons in the tin can. You can look up the double broiler method, but you basically bring water to boil in a large pot. Place the tin can in the boiling water (not touching bottom of pan) and place the crayons in the tin can. Stir until crayons become melted wax.
3. Pour melted wax into chocolate molds. Don't worry about spillage over…it can be easily fixed later. Let the wax set. Then put in freezer for 15 minutes.
4. Remove from freezer. Crayons should just pop out with a little tap. You can easily break off any excess wax with your fingers.
5. Package in your favorite way!
This is really a great project for broken crayons, but I didn't have enough broken ones so I splurged for $2 box of crayons to go with the few broken ones. I've had these Christmas chocolate molds for awhile, but I think this idea is a little friendlier to my waistlineJ.
The Christmas themed crayons…hopefully no one mistakes them for chocolate.
CAUTION: When in a hurry being a 'last minute Christmas diva' be sure not to go too fast or you will pour hot crayon wax all over your kitchen counter. The good thing is that it does clean up just fine with a little time and patience.
My husband took Lil Man to pre-school to give me a little extra time to finish these gifts before his class finished. Since I spilled half my crayon wax onto the counter I didn't have as many crayons as I was hoping so I needed something else to package it with. I had a pad of paper so I ripped off about 10 sheets each, punched a hole in the corner, tied a ribbon, and tossed it into a clear bag with the crayons. Oh yeah, I added a "Merry Christmas" note on the front of the paper using the crayons.
Enjoy your "last minute Christmas diva" project. I LOVED how these turned out, and as soon as the holidays are done I'm going to purchase some of my favorite chocolate molds and make a whole bunch of these that I can use for party favors, last minute kid gifts, etc. Happy Holidays!
Be inspired, get creative, and have fun!
